100 Singers - ERICH KUNZ скачать в хорошем качестве

100 Singers - ERICH KUNZ

Erich Kunz, Baritone (1909-1995) Mozart: DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE "Papagena! Papagena!" With Elisabeth Rutgers, Soprano Conducted by Karl Böhm (1944) My personal opinion: Rodolfo Celletti (1917-2004) was an influential Italian music critic with a sharp pen. The Viennese Mozart style of the post-war period was not one of the things that gave him pleasure: "I think this Mozart is all too often silly and sugared with lots of beeps and sighs. The men sing effeminate and the women appear terribly frigid in their attempts, to fake eroticism." Baritone Erich Kunz (1909-1995), a small man with a small voice, belonged to the inner circle of the Viennese Ensemble right from the beginning. A favorite of Josef Krips and Karl Böhm, Kunz was used many times in comic and character roles - and anytime, when it was not necessary to boast with a lush voice ... After the release of the LE NOZZE DI FIGARO album in 1950 (with George London, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Irmgard Seefried and Sena Jurinac under Karajan), an Austrian critic wrote, the voice of Kunz was "not sufficient enough for Figaro." But it was exactly this role he performed most at the State Opera: 331 times between 1945 and 1975, followed by Papageno in DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE (242x) and Leporello in DON GIOVANNI (173x). Indeed, if you hear Kunz as Figaro, you may think that he was more a singing comedian than a comedic singer. Compared to Ezio Pinza, Paul Schöffler, Cesare Siepi, Giuseppe Taddei or Walter Berry, Kunz gives only a portrait of Figaro en miniature. In Mozart operas, Erich Kunz - charming, folksy and playful - was practically the personification of what Rodolfo Celletti criticized. Perhaps he was right, but I like the cozy singing of Kunz very much. In my view it does not matter if a singer is always able to fulfill the highest demands. Kunz had his difficulties with higher notes. From time to time a transposition ... who cares? The craze for high notes is questionable anyway, the more so as most listeners can't distinguish different tones that are close together (especially, since the same pitch sounds differently with various singers). Erich Kunz charmed his audience not by overdone vocal stunts, but rather with the agility of his singing - a liveliness that is also preserved on his discs. One good example is Karl Böhm's 1944 recording of DIE MEISTERSINGER VON NÜRNBERG with the young Kunz as Beckmesser, a role in which he is less grumpy than, for instance, Benno Kusche. The comic of Erich Kunz is more profound. In the foolish serenade "Den Tag seh' ich erscheinen", he even performs Beckmesser's unartistic adornments with accurate shaping and absolute precision. Kunz is never focused on cheap effects. When he played the offended, he only changed the inflection of his voice (on stage and in movies, there was also his snobbish facial expression too). Hardly any other singer could display the arrogance and indignation of high-ranking personalities as hilarious as Kunz. A comedian make funny things, but a good comedian make things funny ... As I have already indicated, in the role of Mozart's Figaro, Erich Kunz was certainly surpassed by baritone-colleagues with stronger voices. After all, Figaro is a somewhat naive, but all the more courageous free spirit who rebels openly against his master. The French Revolution in neighboring France is not far away anymore. The action of LE NOZZE DI FIGARO takes place around 1780. Kunz sings "Se voul ballare, signor contino" (1950, Karajan) emphatically, but the timid repetitions of "Si!" raises doubts about his firmness. Siepi, Berry and even Prey have sung this much stronger - with clenched fists and bared teeth ... The most important role in the long career of Kunz was undoubtedly Papageno, in which he mastered the balancing act between cheerfulness and melancholy in a fabulous way. It was one of those lucky cases in which a singer becomes completely one with the character he embodies. In addition to many performances at opera houses in Austria and Germany, he recorded the part three times under Karajan (1950, 1952) and Furtwängler (1951). However, I prefer the scenes conducted by Karl Böhm in November 1944 for the Reichssender Wien. For my tribute to Erich Kunz, I chose the soliloquy in which Papageno despairs on life, followed by the hope-giving duet with Papagena. Here in his mid-thirties, his voice is in full bloom. One of the most graceful Mozart interpretations I've ever heard ...